Ask Rezzz

There are many certifications out there in the market that a freelancer can grab. It can help your business grow, both as social proof, but also in your lead generation and sales.

If you are specializing your business, sometimes you focus in on a particular piece of software that helps your clients’ business. Sometimes you focus on a specific coding language. Sometimes you focus on a platform.

If you are focusing on these things and know them in and out, having a certification in them gives you that badge of honor. It says that the company recognizes you as someone who can work in all the nooks and crannies of that thing.

If it’s something you can justify and get that return go for it. If it’s something that is more of an ego thing, then maybe check yourself on it.

Scope creep worries even the most experienced freelancer. After a heard lesson early on in my career, I don’t look at scope creep as being something that’s a bad thing anymore. It’s more of an opportunity to be honest.

Now don’t get me wrong, scope creep when handled wrong can kill everything about a project. The deadline, profitability, the trust. So it’s so very important that scope creep is handled in the best way possible.

Remember scope creep starts with a simple ask. Usually, it’s the client asking if something can be done.

Don’t immediately jump on it to get it done, but don’t immediately dismiss it either. Take note of it. Write it down some place even. Time to keep track of it.

You will learn the easy 3 step process on how to handle scope creep the best way possible so that you can maintain client trust and successfully complete the project.

It is natural as a freelancer to want to look down the road of another path. Catering to 2 target markets is not easy, especially if they are vastly different.

If you are building a product, course, writing a book, whatever that thing is alongside your services, it's not uncommon to feel overwhelmed.

It’s definitely hard and something that I do struggle with.

The biggest thing to do is remained focus on the tasks at hand.

It’s too easy to get overwhelmed or get off the rails with the shiny objects.

Setting goals and knowing what those incremental steps to achieve those goals help greatly.

A lot of it is planning and being effective in that planning. Implement quickly, fail fast, learn and improve, seems to be the recipe for me.

As a freelancer, there needs to be a balance between your business moving forward and your clients’ businesses.

As a freelancer you should think like a business owner, not an employee. If your business is not moving forward, your clients will ultimately suffer too.

It’s a scary thing because you have all your eggs in one basket so to speak. If that client doesn’t need you anymore, then what?

I think this is a question that most freelancers ask themselves but are hesitant to act on it.

I get it, if it’s the bulk of your income, what can you do right? You don’t want to rock the boat.

In this episode you will learn what the very first step is to get out from that one client being more of your income.

Instead of thinking about automation as this big complex behemoth, think of it as something that connects 2 actions together that makes your life easier.

So when I started freelancing, I would meet people for sales meetings at their office, at a coffee shop, or restaurants.

I wanted to save a few minutes so that I could grab a cup of coffee for everyone at the meeting, so I used automation to connect my Google Calendar to Evernote.

As a freelancer, you are always looking to optimize your tools and work with the best out there. But “What is the best” is such a subjective term.

When looking for tools, it’s easy to get into the features and all the shiny objects thinking that you need it.

Often times you get so into the tools that you don’t actually get work done.

I suggest you work backwards.

What I mean by that is start where you get money.

This episode covers the things to think about from working backwards in your business.

I also share the tools I use in my own business, and why.

If you are involved in a project or client but at a point where you are starting to figure out your niche. Or maybe you are starting to specialize your freelance business even more to refine your services.

It’s always tough to try and figure out how to handle the current clients.

There are several things you can do though and one thing that you have to do.

You have to finish the job. Plain and simple. Whatever you said you would do, you have to deliver on that.

Then based on if they fall into your new specialty, how can you serve them best. Present them a no-brainer offer and have them as your very first client under you new business services.

“Freelancing” itself is a business and reliability of income for any business depends on the health of that business and the processes of getting the income.

If you build a business of your own, which freelancing is, you need to understand all the aspects of the business, at least at a basic level. You should always be learning, marketing, and growing. Evolving your business processes as you grow.

You make your income reliable, by doing all these things in your business.

There are no guarantees of course, but if you’d like to have your income reliable and build yourself a future-proof business where you are the brand, freelancing is the way to go, and it can lead to reliable income.

Want to specialize your freelance business?

This is the 5th episode in the series to niche down and I'll walk you through how to find and land that first client.

There are 6 steps that you need to do in order to find and land that client.

Can you land 1, 2, maybe 5 new clients in this first test of your market? Obviously, it depends on your availability and service. But if you can land one or 2 then you’ve moved in that direction towards your specialty.

It may not seem like a lot, but you need that first step into it. As you learn from these interactions, talks, and projects, you’ll position yourself better for the next round. You’ll start to build a library of case studies related to the specialty. And more importantly remain on track because you have focused your organic sales around a specific market and away from being that generalist.

In freelancing, the best way to research is to talk with people.

You want to jump into some quick and easy questions.

1. How is everything going?

2. What made the decision for you to choose me over someone else?

3. Is there anything that I can be doing better?

As you wrap up the conversation ask them if they know of anyone like themselves that has a similar project and that you would appreciate a quick introduction.

Now if you don’t have any past clients in that quadrant you built out in "How do I choose the niche?" because you are just starting out or you haven’t worked with anyone that you really enjoyed yet, you can still do this.

Take the 3 questions above with you and start up some conversations. To make it less overwhelming, go to the event and have 3 conversations at a minimum where you get these answers.

These conversations will also lead in to you getting work overtime because you are talking about that “one thing” and starting to lay the groundwork for being the expert.